2/13/03A
quick break from the action...

There's
a ton of things to write about and absolutely no time to write it all.

It feels
like I'm talking through a wall grate on my way to some daring escape.
"I'll meet you on the other side!" I'd say, as the barks of
approaching dogs rushed me along the inside of a metallic air conditioning
duct.

Here's what
it is, mostly: the traveling. Last weekend, the LCP
went to South Texas to perform in McAllen. McAllen is one of about a dozen
relatively small towns interlocked to form the Rio Grande Valley, where
most of us in the troupe were born and raised. So this was our first real
homecoming, a chance to see if we were really funny on our home turf.
It turns out we're funnier there than just about anywhere else since most
our senses of humor are decidedly "Valley" in nature.

It was a
road trip, and I got to ride in the Mondo Minivan, which Mical's mom generously
donated to us for the ride down. I was completely exhausted and we were
leaving on a Thursday, just a few hours after I'd left work. Somehow,
I've gotten into the habit of staying up until around 2 or 3 a.m. every
night, whether there's stuff going on or not. The silly part is that I'm
not going out or drinking or partying or partaking of any leafy substances.
I just stay up doing whatever, you know? Playing Sims Online, doing
laundry, reading, catching up on episodes of Kingpin I missed,
vacuuming (yes, I vaccum at 2:30 a.m.), cleaning kitty litter. I've taken
the idea that there aren't enough hours in the day for all the things
I do in a day to a bizarre literal place where I force myself to stay
up, stretching the available time in the day. Of course, it's sleep that
suffers, as I've learned time and time again.

Which is
all to say that on that road trip down, I was toast. usually Tuesdays
and Wednesdays are fine, but by Thursday, my body has started to give
it up to fatigue and I approach, zombielike, to feast on the human brains
of my bed pillows in slumber surrender.

I wasn't
about to drive six hours by myself on a Thursday night.

The El Rey theater in McAllen, Texas.

So the minivan
was a godsend. I drove us to Gonzalez, Texas, to pick it up and then it
was a (somewhat) straight shot down with Mical and Nick taking turns driving
the minivan. (It was a wonderful minivan too. Comfy. Roomy. With about
a gajillion controls for back-seat passengers. I think there was a knob
that let the backseat passengers go to an entirely different destination
than the front-seaters.) Our first order of business was picking up a
cheap comedy cassette tape at a gas station since the only thing the minivan
didn't have was a CD player. We found an old Rodney Dangerfield
comedy album called "I Don't Get No Respect," for about $5.
Here's the genius part: Side One is called, "I Don't Get No Respect."
Side Two? "I Don't Get No Respect."

And it
was funny! I mean, these are ancient, ancient jokes, but they still hold
up. He told a lot more stories back then; it wasn't all one liners. But
the one-liners were pretty damned funny, too. Stuff like where he complains
about how crappy his car is and he says, "My car is terrible. On
Sundays, I take my family out to the country for a push."

I slept
and whipped out my laptop for a little recapping then slept some more.
Once there, we cased out the theater, did our first show, and it went
great. Adrian did his LCD projector/portable DVD player trick during our
off hours and soon we were watching a completely bootlegged (but perfect
DVD quality) copy of The Two Towers on an entire living room wall
of a small house that Mical's parents own down there. That Sméagol.
He's the man.

We went
to Mexico on Saturday and I bought a $1 Gorillaz poster for my brother
and bought back some bottles of liquor ($10 for Smirnoff Vanilla Twist?
Can't beat that. Then it was another show, a great audience, cold weather,
furtive sleep, and the drive back.

This weekend
it's Vancouver.
And next weekend, I'm going to Houston for a Smallville-related
thing.

It just
trip after trip and I'm treasuring the little quiet moments at home. I'm
also physically exhausted. My body's a wreck, my eyes and my brain are
getting used to functioning on little pockets of sleep and moments here
and there of mind rest.

Not a lot
is getting done outside of these trips, honestly. I'm not doing enough
of my own writing, or keeping up with correspondence. I'm throwing myself
into keep reserves of energy for these shows and for throwing myself into
work when I'm at home so I won't fall behind. I'm constantly on the defensive,
feeling like I have to justify every moment I'm away from the office,
every day of official vacation time I'm using even though it's really
mine to spend whenever I need to.

It feels
like the feeding of two beasts, one at work, another a group project I
love that feels like it's going somewhere great. But in between these
two big things, I'm feeling very small right now, real Tiny Man, hiding
my own voice until all the traveling is done and I can sit down and start
to speak again, in my own voice, not that of the group I willingly throw
my energy into or the place that pays for my home and allows me the freedom
to go to all these places.

I'm thrilled
and happy, but am also looking forward to things stopping a bit so I can
catch my breath, look in the mirror and try to remember exactly who it
is that's looking back.

Big
pimpin'

Lots
of stuff this time. A new
recap of Smallville is up. I wrote nearly all of
it on my trip to the Valley, and somehow it ended up much
longer than what I usually write. But screw it. It was a fun
episode and I was having a good time.

Wrote
a review
of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The woman I saw
it with pointed out that Bebe Neuwirth's only role in the
film seems to be to say, in an extremely important way, "She's
writing a story about How to Lose a Guy in 10 DAYS!"
She says it like six times in the movie. And in the ads
for the movie. It's to where I can't get her saying that out
of my head. When I was writing that review, I thought, "He's
writing a review of a movie about HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN
10 DAYS!"